Bali faces Corby backlash

Page Tools

Australian holiday-makers and travel agents have threatened to
snub Bali if accused drug smuggler Schapelle Corby is found guilty
by the Indonesian courts.

Almost 70 per cent of respondents to a nationwide survey of
travel agents said the outcome of the case would affect the way
they sold Bali holiday packages and air fares.

Conducted by travel industry journal Travel Daily, the
survey showed 68 per cent of the 168 respondents would stop
promoting Bali as a destination if Corby, 27, found at Bali airport
with 4.1 kilograms of marijuana in her bodyboard bag, was
convicted.

Instead, they would encourage tourists to visit alternative
destinations such as Fiji, Phuket, Vanuatu, the Cook Islands and
New Zealand.

If the travel industry boycott takes effect, it is expected to
make a serious dent in the already fragile Balinese economy that
has suffered a series of blows in recent years.

"I believe Schapelle is innocent," one Sydney travel agent told
the survey. "If she is found guilty with the evidence she has
presented to the judges, I certainly will not travel to Bali or
recommend or sell Bali."

Travel Daily editor Bruce Piper said he was surprised at
the flood of passionate responses to the survey.

And while travel agents and tourists are turning off Bali as a
destination, other countries are picking up the slack.

Many of Fiji's hotels and resorts are booked out until the end
of the year and Hawaii recorded a 44.4 per cent surge in visitors
from Australia in 2004, Hawaiian Tourism Authority figures
show.